Alert. Here is a personal entry that contains many juicy details of my oh-so-thrilling life. So if you are really into stalking me, you just hit the jackpot. Hell yea!
If you are new to the FUCk-OFf Saga(yes I know my title is so clever), read from the beginning with Chapter 1: The Mystic Questioner of Questy Questions and Question Stuff.
If you missed our last episode, check out Chapter 2: Waiter There is an Answer in My Soup
If you are really good at stalking me and are all up to speed on my personal life crises, carry onward, friend.
Chapter 3: The Donut and The Donut Hole
So there I was, 4:00 AM, 5th of July, picking up red solo cups, foam swords, and certain people's underwear in the rain, shivering in my tank top and yoga pants and wondering if there was ever going to be anything to life but stabby pains in my chest. You know how when you have insane cramps, and you are curled up on your bed and feeling like nothing exists in the rest of the world, there is only cramp pain enveloping your abdomen and blood eating your once harmless and friendly labia, turning it into a monster of un-forseen doom? Well if you are guy, then no, but I suppose it could also be something like being kicked in the balls if that comparison works better for you. Anyway, it was something like that, except instead of my female organs literally shedding their exoskeletons and squirting the excess blood out of my nearest body cavity, it was just my heart squealing and running around bumping into my chest like a piglet runt because it's a huge baby and everything. No matter what I did, I felt like it would never shut up.
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| I think I just took this too far |
I did not know John Keats very well. He was currently employed at my previous workplace, and since I had just invited everyone from there as a whole, he showed up. I did not have a problem with this as I generally assume that if you work where I used to work, you are probably a pretty cool person and we should probably be friends. But John Keats had been not in the best of sorts that evening and seemed to turn off most people around him. I wasn't sure if this was normal or not. I tried to be supportive, but considering that I was feeling much like a lawnmower had just took my insides out to a really nice dinner and then never called like it said it would, my ability to help other people feel good was limited. John Keats seemed as if he were in a really dark place, but there was a lot of alcohol going around and I had plenty of other distractions, so eventually he left and I didn't take much notice. As long as he was good to drive, I was content.
But Rudyard Kipling, who had also left the party awhile ago, had been up late on Facebook and noticed some posts from John Keats that were not so happy AKA borderline suicidal. They were vague in their meaning, but it was enough to be concerned. Rudyard Kipling asked if he was still there and if he was not, if someone was sober enough to go check on him and make sure everything was ok. I did a once over of my house to make sure John Keats had left and then, being insanely sober and not really ready to deal with laying back down and staring at my wall some more anyway, I offered to go check on him. In the process I had accidentally awoken my friend, William Blake. I told William Blake of the situation at hand and said I was leaving and didn't know when I'd be back. William Blake offered to come with and I said that was fine, but I was leaving right then. William Blake didn't even bother to go find his shoes; We jumped in my brother's truck right away and were off.
I am kind of odd in the way that I go into Super Action Meri Hero mode whenever I observe someone depressed/suicidal and in need of help. It is probably because I have been there so many times myself and I have been fortunate to have had the aid of some really super-amazing-fantastic-friendly-friends that I feel the need to pay it forward. Or maybe I just don't want anyone else to have the same problems so I can feel special and miserable all in one tightly wrapped burrito of depression fun times. Either or... I tend to spring into action about these sorts of things. They are important to me. Besides, if you could make a life or death difference in someone's life, wouldn't you? No? Well you are a terrible person then.
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| If I were a comic book super hero action Meri, this is how Marvel or DC or whatever would draw me. I decided I'd throw in sexy hair and massive biceps because why not? (What is really sad is that I am making fun Escher Girls style, but I am so freakishly flexible I can actually strike this pose.) |
As I was driving in the wee hours of the morning to the address Rudyard Kipling had given me, my brain started conjuring horrible images of what could possibly be waiting us when we arrived and my stomach did a little somersault. "Please, oh please let this be a false alarm," it whispered to me. It also said, "Hey I'm really fucking hungry, all you've eaten in the past 8 hours is some potato chips and half of one really gross starchy hot dog bun." But I just ignored that.
When we arrived my heart immediately sank. Not because anything bad had happened--at least not yet--but because the address led us to an apartment building, but we did not have a unit number. I adamantly started writing messages on Faceboook to Rudyard Kipling, who began super sleuthing all over the internet like the super hero that he was to figure it out. Meanwhile William Blake and I started wandering around the complex to see if there were any clues to help us figure out where he lived: mailboxes, a night manager, people hanging around, phone numbers to call...anything.
It was unfortunate that it was 4:15 AM in the morning at this point and also that the apartment complex was rather large, which made our search difficult. Add on top of this the fact that my left foot was swollen like a pineapple in a bathtub/pregnant alien eggs and I was limping like the hunchback of Notre Dame and William Blake was barefoot...We were not exactly the best pair for the job. We did manage to find one dude (drunkenly?) passed out on an armchair on his front porch who was just barely awake enough to talk to. He thought the description of John Keats sounded familiar! Score! ...But had no idea where he lived. Then he passed out again.
As time went by my stomach kept doing somersaults, reminding me that the more time that passed meant a greater chance of bad things happening and the whole evening could end up with police lights and ambulances and lots of crying--crying that would actually be justified and not over hormonal bullshit, which is the worst kind of crying. I started texting and calling all the numbers I had from work to see if anyone could even tell me what John Keats' car might look like so we might get an approximate location of his apartment. Rudyard Kipling was still super sleuthing away. I finally got in touch with one of my coworkers who had actually been to his apartment! Hooray! ...But she didn't remember the unit number. She gave us a pretty rough explanation of where in the building it was. We went where we thought she may have been referencing and decided to knock, hoping that we weren't accidentally disturbing an innocent stranger at 5:00 AM.
We knocked multiple times but got nothing. I sank down to the ground, exhausted and starting to lose hope. Rudyard Kipling, who had been calling John Keats and suicide hotlines to try to and get in touch with John Keats finally heard from John Keats! He was ok! For now! ....But his messages hinted that the case might soon be otherwise. Then he stopped talking to Rudyard Kipling. More somersaults. Ninja somersaults. Summer Olympic trampoline event somersaults. Oh god.
I looked up. Me and William Blake were sitting on the floor right in front of the office, which I had previously thought was an mythical thing, since there were signs pointing all over the place indicating that one was around somewhere, but seeing as we had just hobbled around for 45 minutes and hadn't seen it, I decided it was like fairies or 9/11 or something. There were signs with lots of numbers all over the door and I started pounding them into my phone for Rudyard Kipling to call. He got in contact with the maintenance man, who likely had access to a list of residents and might be able to help us find John Keats! Hooray! ...The maintenance man swore and hung up on Rudyard Kipling.
We were doomed.
In a last ditch effort, I tried calling John Keats to see if maybe his phone would play through the door and we could at least know if we had the right apartment or not. Not only did we hear the ringtone from the door literally right next to the one we were at, but John Keats picked up, since he didn't recognize my number.
"John Keats. Where are you?" I was super stern like Mom when little Billy has been out all night and never called.
"Who is this?" John Keats sounded rather groggy.
"This is Robert Frost. Where are you? Are you ok?" (Hey, I get a poet name too, right?)
"I'm at home, I'm fine..."
"What is your apartment number? We want to come see you and make sure you are ok."
John Keats gave me his number and I scrambled up with William Blake and immediately knocked on the door right next to us. John Keats let us in.
Here is a basic illustration of how it went down:
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| I sincerely apologize to the friends and family of Robert Frost. The friends and family of William Blake and John Keats can suck it because they've been dead way longer and I didn't give them boobs anyway. |
He was alive. He was fine. It was all good. My stomach stopped somersaulting and went back to just being hungry and hungover. I suddenly realized I had no idea what to do from here. I started messaging Rudyard Kipling again meanwhile trying to maintain conversation with John Keats, as if at the very second we stopped talking he might grab a razor and slit his wrists or something. Rudyard Kipling went to a suicide hotline website and started coaching me on what to say via Facebook on my phone. I tried to be as non-judgemental as possible (which is very hard to do when you are a girl and that is what you are basically raised to be by society), listen carefully, and make sure John Keats promised he would be safe and not hurt himself. John Keats did not seem phased by this. He apparently did not want to kill himself. He just wanted to leave society behind and go live in the woods and see how long he could survive. Which was almost the same thing just a little less violent, I guess, and not as immediate of an issue. As crazy as this plan, or lack thereof, sounded to me, it was better than the alternative I had feared.
After 30 minutes of talking, trying to reason about life, the universe, and whether or not human beings care about each other with John Keats and failing, making sure he promised he would not hurt himself, that he would take time to think things over, and also forcing him to reassure the rest of the internet that he was not about to kill himself so no one else would get confused, William Blake and I left. It was 6:00 AM. The sun had risen. We stopped by a 7-11 and I got one of those fancy Starbucks drinks to make my stomach stop being whiny and then went back to my house.
I couldn't even go inside. I felt like life had just pummeled me in the face major-big-time. I sat in my front yard, sipping fancy Starbucks drink with William Blake. The same friend who had told us where the apartment was had risen to get to work. She told me that I was such a good person. Just like the previous evening when everyone kept reassuring me that I was hot, throughout the rest of the day people kept reassuring me I was a good person. People seemed so...I don't know how to put it... incredulous? that I had done such a thing for someone I barely knew. Someone that wasn't even my friend. As if they would not have done the same. Which is what I assumed.
Apparently I have too much faith in society.
Me. Too much faith. Yea. Right.
Sad.
I eventually did go back inside and slept for an hour or so. Then I got back up again and started cleaning. Other people rose and helped me, being the courteous party goers they were. I had also told them that they had to.
The rest of the day was like grey, fuzzy haze. And not the fun kind when you go for a run in the really early morning and feel all fresh and good about yourself. I felt like a zombie. I went to brunch, where I didn't touch any of my food except a couple of really mushy slices of banana and a giant chai. I came home. I tried to sleep. I failed. I turned on Arrested Development, hoping it might make me laugh or comfort me, but instead all I felt was a burning inside me. A burning pain of confusion, anger, frustration, and most of all sadness... What had just happened to me? What was wrong? Everything felt like such a scattered, chaotic mess that I didn't even know where the source of pain was coming from.
In retrospect it was probably the fact that I hadn't slept in 36 hours, kept drinking secretly caffeinated beverages, and hadn't eaten for a considerable amount of time that made me feel like I was going to explode. But I just thought I was broken and dysfunctional. I somehow found myself switching between hyperventilating and sobbing my face off the entire afternoon. My insides burned. My heart screamed. My chest continued to ache in a very real and physical way. Even though I had just spent an entire evening trying to prevent someone from dying, I wanted to stop existing myself. This wasn't just stupid fake leprechaun analogies to explain emotions. This was real, unfiltered pain that had been waiting to get out for a long time.
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| I think this is going to become a thing. Once again, apologies to Robert Frost and Co. (Do you like my amazing hand renderings?!? YES I AM IN ART SKUL). (...I should stop drawing these at 3 AM.) |
And yet.
When I was packing up the next day to go back to California, I still felt sad and heavy. I still didn't want to leave.
I had all of the information I needed. It had all been laid out in front of me, right there, sitting on the top of my packed up suitcase like it had just been waiting the entire time to show up. I had just arrived upon serious decision making time.
Dun. Dun. DUN.
Join us next time for the exciting conclusion of the Fucked Up Circle of Friendship Saga in Chapter 4: I Still Haven't Thought of a Title Yet But I Promise This Thing Is Almost Over!
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